Square Enix wants more online freedom

Square Enix president Yoichi Wada wants platform holders to provide more freedom for publishers to build businesses within their consoles' online services.

"I would like them to come up with a network infrastructure that will allow the publishers like us to freely design different business schemes," Wada told our sister site GamesIndustry.biz, describing network services as "the true battlefield" in the games market.

"For the publishers the advantage of the networks is that it allows more types of diversified revenue models and I don't want their networks to interfere with that," he elaborated.

Networking is more important to the future of games consoles than 3D, motion control and other "minimal additions to the existing technologies" showcased during Microsoft, Nintendo and Sony's E3 conferences, he said, speaking during the show.

"What we are interested in is the layer or level closest to our customers, those that form communities. Anything below that level is something either we could do or we could take advantage of somebody else's technology and whatever it is we will choose the most efficient means to get there.

"The closest image I can think of is Valve's Steam service. But I do not want to end up fighting with Valve or the game console manufacturers and as a diplomat and ambassador I will not be saying anything that will offend them.